


to grease this destined wheel

by mayachain



Series: birthday!verse [48]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Birthday, Established Relationship, Herbology, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Mental Instability, New Relationship, Post-Battle of Hogwarts, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon, the bouncing incident, whatever is going on with Theodore Nott
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-31
Updated: 2018-07-31
Packaged: 2019-06-19 07:34:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15505497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mayachain/pseuds/mayachain
Summary: Three times Neville held conversations with plants on his birthday.





	to grease this destined wheel

**Author's Note:**

> My summer brain thought July 30th was on Tuesday. Uhm.

**July 30th, 1988**

Neville somehow made it behind closed door before the tears.

He’d _bounced!_

Downstairs, Aunt Enid was still sobbing from happiness. Uncle Algie was sniffling. Even _Gran_ had cried, a little, when she’d embraced him. 

Neville had known instinctively that _he_ could not cry in front of them.

He clutched the pot that held his new Carnivorous Jade to his chest and couldn’t stop –

– falling, the ground ever closer and Uncle Algie not quick enough to grab his wand, the porch would break all his bones –

He could hardly wave his hands enough to reassure the Crimson Ivy. Neville didn’t know if he was crying from fear, crying from relief, crying because _finally_ he’d –

– kissed the ground and popped right up; up, down, up, down, seven times around the garden before rolling to a stop –

Outside the window, he could just make out the Wiggentree perform a victory dance with its upmost branches. It made him smile through his tears, then huff, then giggle. He’d bounced.

He’d _bounced!_

 

**July 30th, 1998**

“I’ve never in my life received so many letters before,” Neville breathed. “Never in my life.” Congratulations, adulations, sweets, and only a small portion – a small _pile_ \- was from people he even knew.

There were senders, strangers, who wanted to curry favours from someone they perceived as a hero. Maybe a few were too scared to approach the Boy Who Lived, but Neville rather thought a lot of them would accost Harry tomorrow with equal fervour.

There was an envelope adorned with Draco’s handwriting, set aside and left unopened for now. There were letters from all of the D.A., from kids of all ages he remembered from Hogwarts. A heartfelt note that had made him cry: penned in an adult hand in a corner of the too-cheery postcard from Dennis Creevy.

“This is insane,” he told the Jade. His old friend burped; earlier, it had snatched up and eaten the only letter that’d held a curse. 

‘I know why,’ he thought, looking helplessly at all the owls had brought – were still bringing – but in his heart of hearts he couldn’t quite comprehend what he could have possibly done to earn them.

“You’ll help me, right?” he asked. Together, he and the Jade went through the pile marked ‘strangers’ to see if he and the sender had some actual personal connection. Provided there was, Neville resolved to reply to each one.

 

**July 30th, 2008**

“Come on, please,” Draco asked the Crooning Fern. “Please tell me you sense one of your mates on this hill. Behind that hill. The one after that. Please. _Please,_ for Neville’s birthday?”

Neville huffed a laugh as the Fern turned its single petal away from Draco, unimpressed.

“Please,” Draco tried again, “please, Theo isn’t even his friend, he’s mine, please can we get this search _over with_ so he won’t have to fight another Dark Lord and can just enjoy?”

Neville privately thought that Theodore Nott had far too little interest in the concept of followers – or in leaving Millicent’s house, for that matter – to ever become a Dark Lord. The man still needed _help, today_. "I want to take Neville home and watch his face during the toast Augusta has planned for them,” Draco pleaded.

Bribery had not swayed the Fern _at all_. Ten years a herbologist’s boyfriend, Draco knew better than try and threaten a plant.

‘Time for the expert,’ Neville thought, ‘before the layman humiliates himself further. “Are you really, really sure you can sense nothing?” he wheedled. “The sunlight will last us through this hill and the next one. We’ll come back tomorrow if we have to, but that’s another day to leave Frank and Alice alone.”

He felt a twinge of guilt when the Fern let out a dismayed whistling sound, but the search had begun three weeks ago and he wanted to be _done_. 

Slowly, grudgingly, the petal swivelled as the Crooning Fern undertook to home in on a cousin.

 

.


End file.
